Smith v. Romer ( 1997 )

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FEB 11 1997
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT
PATRICK FISHER
Clerk
RONALD LEE SMITH,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
and No. 96-1211
(D.C. No. 94-K-123)
ALONZO BUGGS, (D. Colo.)
Plaintiff,
v.
ROY ROMER, GALE NORTON,
ARISTEDES ZAVARAS, DONICE
NEAL, and JOHN HADLEY,
Defendants-Appellees.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before TACHA, EBEL, and BRISCOE, Circuit Judges.
*
This order and judgment is not binding precedent, except under the
doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. The court
generally disfavors the citation of orders and judgments; nevertheless, an order
and judgment may be cited under the terms and conditions of 10th Cir. R. 36.3.
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist the determination of
this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. The case is therefore
ordered submitted without oral argument.
Plaintiff Ronald Lee Smith appeals from the district court’s order
dismissing one claim of his pro se civil rights action filed pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §
1983 and entering summary judgment on the remaining claims. 1 We review the
district court’s rulings de novo, Roman v. Cessna Aircraft Co., 55 F.3d 542, 543
(10th Cir. 1995) (dismissal under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) for failure to state a
claim); Wolf v. Prudential Ins. Co., 50 F.3d. 793, 796 (10th Cir. 1995) (the grant
or denial of summary judgment motion), and affirm.
Plaintiff is a convicted felon who has been assigned to administrative
segregation at the Colorado State Penitentiary (CSP), which is the highest custody
level in the most controlled environment of the Colorado Department of
Corrections (DOC). He alleges that defendants, Roy Romer (the governor of
Colorado); Gale Norton (the attorney general of Colorado); Aristedes Zavaras (the
executive director of the DOC); Donice Neal (the superintendent of CSP); and
John Hadley (the program director of CSP) have violated his civil rights by (1)
1
Plaintiff Alonzo Buggs failed to sign the notice of appeal, and thus is not a
proper party to the appeal. See 10th Cir. R. 3.1.
-2-
subjecting him to cruel and unusual punishment, (2) interfering with his access to
courts, and (3) depriving him of due process of the law.
I. Cruel and Unusual Punishment
The Eighth Amendment, applicable to the states through the Due Process
Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 666
(1962), prohibits the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment on those
convicted of crimes. A successful Eighth Amendment challenge to conditions of
confinement requires a showing on an objective component, concerning the
seriousness of the deprivation, and a subjective component, concerning the
culpable state of mind of prison officials. See Wilson v. Seiter, 501 U.S. 294,
298 (1991).
The objective component of the test is satisfied only if the alleged
deprivations deny “‘the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities.’” Id. at
298 (quoting Rhodes v. Chapman, 452 U.S. 337, 347 (1981)). In examining an
assertion that numerous conditions interact to form cruel and unusual punishment,
a court must be aware that
Some conditions of confinement may establish an Eighth Amendment
violation ‘in combination’ when each would not do so alone, but only
when they have a mutually enforcing effect that produces the
deprivation of a single, identifiable human need such as food,
warmth, or exercise--for example, a low cell temperature at night
combined with a failure to issue blankets. . . . Nothing so amorphous
as ‘overall conditions’ can rise to the level of cruel and unusual
-3-
punishment when no specific deprivation of a single human need
exists.
Wilson, 501 U.S. at 304-05 (citations omitted).
Inmates assigned to administrative segregation at CSP 2 are confined to their
individual cells for approximately twenty-three hours a day. Plaintiff argues that
this extended cell time constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in view of (1)
the lack of cleaning service or, alternatively, the need for hotter water and
additional cleaning supplies in the cell; (2) the eating of meals in the cell, within
a few feet of the toilet; (3) the limited vocational, educational and recreational
services offered through a television set in the cell; (4) the restriction of exercise
to one hour a day in an individual exercise cell; (5) the presence of a night light
that inmates cannot turn off; and (6) unsanitary and unventilated shower stalls.
Only the allegations relating to conditions in the shower stalls satisfy the
objective prong of the Eighth Amendment test. The other complaints in
plaintiff’s inventory do not relate to life’s necessities. Confinement to a cell for
twenty-three hours a day does not necessarily amount to a constitutional violation.
See Anderson v. County of Kern, 45 F.3d 1310, 1316-17 (9th Cir. 1995); see also
2
The DOC definition of administrative segregation is “the confinement of an
inmate in the most secure, controlled environment available . . . for the purpose of
protecting the security of the facility, staff, inmates and the public.” DOC Reg.
202-2. The DOC periodically evaluates inmates to determine if they may be
advanced through levels of security. DOC Reg. 600-1.
-4-
Peterkin v. Jeffes, 855 F.2d 1021, 1029 (3d Cir. 1988) (confinement for twenty-
two hours a day). As to the allegations concerning cell cleanliness, it is
undisputed that inmates are provided with at least a minimal amount of cleaning
supplies. Requiring inmates to eat meals in cells that they must clean themselves
does not present an excessive risk to inmate health or safety. Cf. Wishon v.
Gammon, 978 F.2d 446, 449 (8th Cir. 1992) (observing that prison officials are
not responsible for allegedly unsanitary cell conditions where prisoner is provided
with supplies to do his own cleaning).
Prisoners have no constitutional right to a range of educational or
vocational opportunities during incarceration. See id., 978 F.2d at 450.
Similarly, they have a right to exercise, but not recreation. A CSP exercise cell
meets minimum standards for exposure to fresh air and exercise. See Housley v.
Dodson, 41 F.3d 597, 599 (10th Cir. 1994); see also Harris v. Fleming, 839 F.2d
1232, 1236 (7th Cir. 1988) (holding no Eighth Amendment violation where
prisoner had shown that he was denied yard or recreation time, but not all
exercise). Finally, difficulty in sleeping caused by a night light with the
brightness of a nine-watt bulb falls far short of an extreme deprivation.
The trial court properly entered summary judgment on these aspects of
plaintiff’s case. Separately or in combination, they do not deprive CSP inmates
of a single human need. However, the allegation that inmates have fainted in the
-5-
shower from lack of ventilation raises a legitimate concern and meets the
objective component of the Eighth Amendment test. Therefore, the claim must be
evaluated under the subjective component, which requires a showing of
“deliberate indifference” on the part of prison officials. Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298.
Deliberate indifference can be found if the prison official knew of and
disregarded an excessive risk to inmate health or safety. “[T]he official must both
be aware of facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk
of serious harm exists, and he must also draw the inference.” Farmer v. Brennan,
511 U.S. 825, 114 S. Ct. 1970, 1979 (1994).
Plaintiff makes no relevant 3 allegations concerning the knowledge or
intentions of the individuals named as defendants. In fact, he does not allege
sufficient facts to demonstrate a culpable mental state on the part of any prison
official, named or unnamed. The record shows that officials identified a shower
ventilation problem when the facility first opened and attempted to correct the
condition. Plaintiff asserts that incidents of fainting have been reported, but does
not provide a time frame. The claim relating to conditions in the shower stalls
was properly dismissed. 4
3
In his brief, plaintiff argues at length that defendants’ political
considerations led to the conditions at CSP. This argument is irrelevant to an
Eighth Amendment analysis.
4
The district court dismissed the claim against all defendants, including the
(continued...)
-6-
II. Right of Access to the Courts
Plaintiff claims that CSP’s policies and procedures infringed upon his
constitutional right of access to the courts, see Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817,
821 (1977), by providing him with insufficient access to library materials and
inadequate assistance from legal personnel.
There is no independent right of access to a law library or legal assistance.
Lewis v. Casey, 116 S. Ct. 2174, 2179-80 (1996). An inmate cannot make out a
claim “simply by establishing that his prison’s law library or legal assistance
program is sub-par in some theoretical sense.” Id. at 2180. The inmate must
show that the denial of legal resources hindered his efforts to pursue a
nonfrivolous claim. Id. at 2179, 2182; see also Penrod v. Zavaras, 94 F.3d 1399,
1403 (10th Cir. 1996). Further, “the injury requirement is not satisfied by just
any type of frustrated legal claim.” Lewis, 116 S. Ct. at 2182. The claim must
involve a direct or collateral attack on the inmate’s sentence or a challenge to the
conditions of confinement. Id.
4
(...continued)
superintendent of CSP, based on plaintiff’s failure to allege personal participation
in the asserted violation. See Bennett v. Passic, 545 F.2d 1260, 1262-63 (10th
Cir. 1976). Because Farmer provides a more appropriate framework for
conditions of confinement cases, we do not analyze the district court’s reasoning
on this issue.
-7-
Plaintiff failed to allege or establish that he was injured by the alleged
inadequacies in CSP’s legal access and assistance programs. His conclusory
statement that he lost two cases “as the result of no legal assistance provided or
available,” Reply Brief at 6, is insufficient to withstand a summary judgment
motion. He provided no information concerning the type of cases that he “lost,”
the procedural posture of the cases, the merits of the cases, or the nature of the
assistance sought from CSP legal personnel. 5 The district court correctly
determined that defendants are entitled to summary judgment on the legal access
claim.
III. Due Process of the Law
Plaintiff’s final claim, asserting deprivation of due process of the law,
raises two possible theories: substantive due process and procedural due process.
To the extent that plaintiff is alleging that conditions at CSP amount to a
substantive due process violation, the claim is “essentially coextensive with
Eighth Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment, and . . .
the Eighth Amendment serves as the primary source of protection for convicted
prisoners.” Lunsford v. Bennett, 17 F.3d 1574, 1583 (7th Cir. 1994). In the
5
We note that CSP conditions did not impede the prosecution of this case.
Plaintiff filed the complaint on January 11, 1994, less than two months after his
CSP reception date of November 23, 1993. He missed no court-imposed
deadlines.
-8-
absence of cruel and unusual punishment, there can be no deprivation of
substantive due process rights. Id.Moreover, plaintiff’s assignment to administrative segregation at CSP does
not provide him with a procedural due process claim. Neither the Constitution
nor Colorado prison rules and regulations create a liberty interest in prisoners’
classifications. See Moody v. Daggett, 429 U.S. 78, 88 n.9 (1976) (concerning
the Constitution); Templeman v. Gunter, 16 F.3d 367, 369 (10th Cir. 1994)
(concerning Colorado provisions). Summary judgment is the appropriate
disposition of plaintiff’s due process claim.
After analyzing plaintiff’s arguments and examining the entire record, we
find no basis of error upon which to reverse. The judgment of the district court
is, therefore, AFFIRMED. The mandate shall issue forthwith.
Entered for the Court
Mary Beck Briscoe
Circuit Judge
-9-